Page Nine

LifeNews.com Pro-Life Headlines

Monday, November 4, 2013

A
heated battle is taking place in Arizona between the fledgling solar
industry and APS, the state’s largest energy company, which
enjoys a state-granted near-monopoly over energy. In sunny Arizona,
it is peculiar that solar energy is being portrayed as the bad guy.
Since Arizona is a Republican-dominated state, APS is sneakily buying
up influential Republicans, both directly and indirectly, to
perpetuate its crony capitalism. The
Washington Postrefersto
these Republicans as “some of the best pollsters and consultants money can buy.”The
spin goes like this, “stop subsidizing the solar industry.” The
word “subsidy” is used to scare Republicans. The solar companies
are being compared to Solyndra, the green energy company that went
bankrupt despite receiving more than $500 million in loans from the
Department of Energy.

The
reality is, the solar industry is not being “subsidized.” Energy
users who do not use APS power, but use their solar panels instead
for power, are simply not being double-charged. When they are not
using APS power, but are instead sending unused solar power energy
back to the grid for others to use, they receive a rebate. This is
known as “net
metering”
and
has been in place since 2009. APS wants to eliminate this, which will
essentially have the effect of charging solar users for APS power
they do not use. Insteadof
receiving 15 cents per kilowatt-hour rebates for power the solar
users send back to the grid, APS wants to reduce the rebate to 4 to
10 cents. This would add $50 to $100 a month to the power bills of
solar users. The utility also wants to start charging solar users a
monthly maintenance fee.

Solar
users are saving everyone additional costs. As energy users dependent
upon APS decrease their usage and move to solar power, fewer
generating stations need to be built, and fewer distribution lines
put into place. While it is true that solar users are paying less
towards the maintenance costs of APS, it is because they are using
less of APS’ services.